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At 10/30/08, 7:00 AM,  dereklipkin said...

I think one of the most eye-opening hip-hop moments I had experienced, though very subtly at first, was when I was in a little village called Luang Prabang, along the Mekong River in Laos.

Down by the river, along the string of guesthouses and restaurants, I spotted graffiti on the wall. It wasn't Dondi or anything close, but it was by the hand of a young person, who grabbed a night black paint can and sprayed "Hip Hop" right onto the wall.

At first, I really thought it was a novelty to see something like that. I even stood by it and had my picture taken, with me doing a corny pose. But as I thought about it later, I realized that, for someone to have taken up a can and spray that in rural Laos was really significant.

I couldn't tell you what kind of hip-hop this person listened to or what art s/he really enjoyed creating, or if that one tag was just the work of a youth bored out of his or her dome and looking to start shit.

But I knew it meant hip-hop had touched this small corner of the world in some way. And that moment let me know that hip-hop is really everywhere. Not dead. Much the opposite. It had to be spreading.

 

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